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A BOOK OF 
VERSE 



BY 



MORRIS GILBERT 



PRIVATELY PRINTED 
MDCCCCXVII 



Y 



Y 






Copyright, 1917 
By Morris Gilbert 



Published, May, 1917 
Five Hundred Copies Printed from Type 




MAY 17 1917 



8a.A4671.67 



v 



^> 



NOTE 

The verse in this book has been written during my undergraduate years at 
Union College. 

I am grateful to the following publications for permission to reprint these 
verses: Poetry: A Magazine of Verse: "To a French Aviator, Fallen in Battle," 
"Prussians Don't Believe in Dreams"; Smart Set: "John-a-Dreams," "When I 
Die," "Cats," "All" (under the title "A Cigarette in Slender Fingers"), "Irish 
Kisses," "Apostrophe"; The Independent: "Germany," "Gotterdammerung 
Before Verdun," "'Wars Are for Youth to Wage'"; Life: "Dalliance"; The 
New York Tribune: "Henry James"; Live Stories: "A Wish"; Judge: "The 
Poet Sings the Gay Madness of Fashion." 

Morris Gilbert. 



TO MOTHER AND FATHER 



Digitized by the Internet Archive 
in 2011 with funding from 
The Library of Congress 



http://www.archive.org/details/bookofverseOOgilb 



To a French Aviator, Fallen 


in Battle 






i 


So Far .... 






2 


John-a-Dreams 








3 


Eight Lines from a Sonnet . 








4 


Germany .... 








5 


Prussians Don't Believe in Dreams 








7 


Wind . 








9 


Sapling ..... 








IO 


Dawn .... 








ii 


Comrade .... 








12 


Three Wishes . 








13 


Irish Kisses 








14 


"Wars Are for Youth to Wage" 








15 


Gotterdammerung before Verdun 








16 


Will 








17 


Henry James 












18 


Obligations 












19 


Achievement 












20 


The Lecture Room 












21 


R 












22 


Things 












23 


Black-Smoke 












26 


A Wish . 












27 


Sestet 












28 


You 












29 


Apostrophe 












30 


Dalliance 












3i 


The Poet Sings the Ga 


y Mac 


Iness c 


>f Fas] 


lion 




32 



[ vii ] 



To Several 


34 


All .... 


3S 


Odalisque 


. ... 36 


Cats .... 


37 


Some Day 


38 


When I Die . 


39 


Immortality 


40 



[ viii ] 



A BOOK OF VERSE 



TO A FRENCH AVIATOR, FALLEN IN BATTLE 

You laughed and said, "A zut !" and in a trice 

Lifted "Celeste" in circles twice or thrice 

Above the hangar-roof, and then sped on 

And up and shot away — and so were gone. . . . 

And when they found you like a wasp beside 

The carcass of the Luftschif still you cried, 

"A zut, mes braves!" and laughed — and then you died. . . 

It may be best you came to ground that way; . 
For who knows where your vivid careless play 
Of spirit and bravado might have led? — 
Some night you might have kept straight on instead, 
And then at dawn, perhaps, with some surprise, 
Might have beheld the roofs of Paradise 
Perched like Montmartre upon a little hill, 
Speckless and gabled, fresh, and very still. 

And you would twist and duck and hover down 
And circle 'round the walls above the town, 
With Saints and Martyrs standing over-awed 
To see you 'planing on the winds of God. . . . 

Perhaps you might come down at twelve o'clock 
To puff a caporal, and sip a bock ! 



[ 1 1 



SO FAR 

So far, then, we find our way, 

(Nothing less availing) 
Find it strait ; but find it may- 
Home us at the end of day 
Better off than we dared say 
At the dawn's assailing. 

So much have we beaten out 

From such valiant trudging: 
We, that chance may never flout, 
And for scorning of all doubt, 
Have a thing to think about, 
Nothing else begrudging. 

Should the Zodiac start and turn, 

Heaving at its tether, 
Moons and suns delirious churn, 
The Galaxy its mooring spurn, 
And sky be all a flamey quern — 

We would laugh together. 



[ 2 ] 



JOHN-A-DREAMS 

I can make a nightingale 

Out of brown paper, 
I can make a purple cloud 

From the kettle's vapor — 
And light a penny candle 

To be a moon behind it 
And let it shine o' nights 

Where I can find it. 

Rumple-stilts-kin's rage 

Will crack the floor again ; 
The Third and Youngest Son 

Will come into his reign — 
Oh, all for me the ragged elves 

Will dance their nimblest caper, 
What with a penny candle 

And some brown paper. 



[ 3 ] 



EIGHT LINES FROM A SONNET 

To think of all that eager wasted worth, 

That quickness, lightness, gayety — that spark 

Of whimsicality and eerie mirth, 

And all that unplumbed fineness — in the dark 

And never to be shined on so that fame 

Might turn the vivid blossom, half foretold, 

Into the glory of an oriflamme 

To burn him forward 'neath its purple fold. 



[ 4 ] 



GERMANY 

Germany? — Why, that's the land 
That children seem to understand. 
They know about the sunny hills 
Crowned with chattery bustling mills, 
Where a Miller's Son may seize his staff 
And swing his pack up with a laugh, 
And gayly go 'mid blessings hurled 
To seek his fortune in the world. . . . 

And children know just how the way 
Winds onward all the livelong day, 
Until at last the Miller's Son 
(The last, the third and youngest one) 
Gets himself lost, at night, alone, 
Within a forest overgrown. 
But there he'll find without a doubt 
Some friend to seek adventure out — 
Perhaps a fiddler debonnaire 
A-prancing with a dancing bear, 
Perhaps a soldier old and gray 
Back from the wars, bereft of pay, 
Perhaps a talking wolf or owl, 
Perhaps a giant on a prowl, 
Or dwarf, or tailor's 'prentice wise 
With whom a youth could fraternize. 

And probably towards break of day 
They'll discover far away 
A tiny spark of light — and then 
They'll see it is a robber's den ! 

[5 ] 



GERMANY 

And so will plot and plan to go 
(The children — ah, the children know!) 
And scare that robber from the spot, 
And eat his meal and make his cot 
Their own to use like honest men — 
(The robber won't come back again) . . . 

Next day the dauntless Miller's Son 
Will start once more when breakfast's done 
To roam the wide world up and down — 
Perhaps to win a royal crown, 
Perhaps to help his brothers when 
They are attacked by evil men — 
Always happy and fine and free 
And shrewd as millers' sons must be, 
Kindly and quick and penniless 
And glad to share his merriness, 
And not a bit surprised to find 
A princess in a pumpkin-rind — 

And that's what little children see 
In Germany . . . 

Ah, Germany! 



[ 6 ] 



PRUSSIANS DON'T BELIEVE IN DREAMS 

A. D. 1916 

Yesterday I went by chance 

Down the by-road called "Romance," 

Past the wicked witch's grate 

(Just outside the village gate) ; 

But the oven-fire was dead 

And I saw no gingerbread 

Youths and maidens propped with care 

Up against the wall — and there 

Was never sign of cat or toad 

Or broomstick with its eerie load, 

Nothing but an empty thatch 

That bats and mice would scorn to scratch. 

Past the gate within the town 
Red-tiled roofs were tumbling down, 
While the town-clock, smoky, dour, 
Struck no sweet fantastic hour 
(Though it used to run askew 
And skip a century or two 
As it chose, and spin around 
Backwards if it liked the sound 
Of an "In that foreign clime ..." 
Or a "Once upon a time . . ."). 
Tufted grass grew up between 
Cobblestones that once had seen 
Fiddling gallows-birds, sad kings, 
Golden swans, and stranger things; 

[ 7 ] 



PRUSSIANS DON T BELIEVE IN DREAMS 

Where once plodded merrily 
'Prentices, gone off to see 
The world, and with an artless ease 
Bring giants suppliant to their knees. . . . 

Then I saw far down the way 

An old man, crippling, bent, and gray — 

"My name is Hans," said he, and smiled — 

"Hans in luck — The Sunday Child!" . . . 

Here was fortune come at last, 

And Hans spoke up of what was past: 

"Times have changed since I was young, — 

The talking oak has lost its tongue, 

No more giants pass by here, 

I've seen no dwarfs this forty year; 

Youngest sons don't come to good 

These days as their grandfathers would — 

'Who is left?' you ask — let's see — 

Why Gluck is left — and then there's me . 

"But Gluck is gouty, tired, and gray, 

Cinderella died today, 

Both the tailor's dancing elves 

Are statues left on dusty shelves ; 

Snow White long has hobbled on 

Through scorning to oblivion; 

There's one queasy snivelling hag 

Living yet in rag and tag — 

Her name I don't remember well — 

But yes — it might be — Rapunzel!" . . . 



[ 8 ] 



WIND 

Wind doesn't wander very far 
But loafs along the world's curbstone, 
Puffing great clouds from his cigar 
And whistling songs in monotone. 

He stares at the skirts of little ships 
A-fluttering past him daintily, 
And makes them nervous as each skips 
Across the puddles of the sea. 



[ 9 ] 



SAPLING 

I shall be happiest when I am old: 

Green branches strain to every guttering breeze, 

Each starting sweat turns hot too soon to cold, 

Where growing is there's never any ease 

But only febrile tremulous ecstasies — 

I shall be glad when I am old. 



[ 10 J 



DAWN 

Day comes like a tiny child, 
Grimy-fingered, quick, and wild, 
Eager half to hide, and half 
To greet you with a shrilling laugh, 

And slip its hand inside your hand 
And tug to make you understand 
That round the corner just a bit 
A Secret waits for you and it — 

Perhaps a rippling yellow worm 
With slimy feelers all a-squirm, 
A robin with a broken wing, 
Or else a dead mole's sepulchring . . 

Day comes like a tiny child, 
Grimy-fingered, quick, and wild, 
Brimming with a timid glee, 
And full of candid mystery. 



[ 11 ] 



COMRADE 

There's dancing in the smile of you, 

And lilting of star-laughter, 
And in your eyes all dreams are true, 

And every dream is fair, 
Springing, winging — then an instant after, 

Dreams are bitter poignant fires that burn for being there. 

We may not bend for Caribbee 

A galleon's thousand sails, 
We may not, in some swift dawn, see 

Our islet in the Main, 
Gleaming, dreaming — for every compass fails, 

And there's no haven charted now for mariners from Spain. 



[ 12 ] 



THREE WISHES 

Oh, if I saw a leprechaun and had three wishes, 

I wouldn't ask for rubies or a golden chain, 

I wouldn't ask for peacocks' tongues served on silver dishes — 

I'd ask for him to steal me back my heart again. 

That would be my first wish and if 'twere granted me, 
I'd ask him next to make my heart all burnished new — 
Oh, that would be my second, and my last wish would be 
For him to take my heart once more and give it back to you. 



[ 13 ] 



IRISH KISSES 

What are they like? asked Phelim Ogh . . . 

Like wild-rose petals floatin' on dew, 

Like spring rain fallin' 

An' dissolvin' away on Lough Ree — 

As fey as the Costa Bower, as heady as poteen, 

Swifter than brickbats at Donnybrook, 

An' as tantalizin' as the whir-r of a blackthorn. 

The Good People made thim 

Out of wisps of laughin' 

An' straws of mortial delight — 

Goold can't put thim on any man's mouth 

But they're cheaper than porridge 

For the gossoon wit' a laugh in his teeth 

An' a way wit' him . . . 

'Twas for lack av thim 

Aristotle invented philosophy. 

Sweeter than blarney they are, an' daintier than silk, 
Softer than prayers goin' up to St. Bridig, 
An' lighter than childers' hands 
On a mother's breast. 

They're as true as him that gets thim, 

An' sure they don't spoil for savin' or spendin' 

For there's more to be had av thim 

Than shamrock on Barrow Banks . . . 

Ask Tom Moore, said Phelim Ogh. 

[ 14 ] 



"WARS ARE FOR YOUTH TO WAGE" 

Wars are for youth to wage ; for youth alone 
Can fling the unsullied ore of his tomorrow 
Into the crucible that flames today; 
Bringing his metal, splendent in the assay, 
To give its heart for lesser gold to borrow, 
And for the giving let the gift atone. 

Wars are for youth to wage ; not even Death 
Can make of war a greater thing than youth — 
So that when It comes walking in the dawn 
Some lad will laugh, rejoicing to be gone 
In witness to the youngest ageless truth 
That honor is more beautiful than breath. 



[ 15 ] 



GOTTERDAMMERUNG BEFORE VERDUN 

A war-gaunt shape with bitter care 
Leans to his task, and waits until, 
Some twilight, 'neath the shrapnel flare 
Release may work its dreary will. . . . 
Who is it standing, massive, still, 
Submissive to a madman's word? 
What Beethoven on Dead Alan's Hill 
Bows o'er a misty clavichord? 

As twilight creeps the shadows creep 

To trenches where death never dies. 

That youth who sleeps a deathy sleep 

Looked up wide-eyed, — with Heine's eyes ! 

There, sorrowful, in rapt surmise 

What wasted Goethe bends his head? 

What child hearts break where some Grimm lies, 

Wondering that the thorn-rose bledf 



[ 16 ] 



WILL 

Shakespeare lived in London-town 
And held men's horses at the Crown; 
And wrote some plays that were to be 
Beacons to immortality — 
But still they conjured from the stalls 
Contemporary curtain-calls. 

He used to dream of many things — 
Of caskets and inveigling rings, 
Camelopard and crocodile, 
And his own serpent of old Nile, 
Battles and courts and carnivals, 
And dead men walking 'neath old walls. 

Nobody ever saw so well 

What Shakespeare saw in men to tell, 

Or knew how close men's laughter nears 

The happy benison of tears, 

Or scribbled down so royally 

The clod's immortal destiny. 

And though he's buried 'neath the stones 
(Whence all forbear to dig his bones), 
We each of us know perfectly 
He would be prince of company, 
Sweeter than Falstaff, great and gay, 
If he were but alive today. 



[ 17 ] 



HENRY JAMES 

He wore the habit of repose, and went 
On fine outbound adventures of the mind, 
And many a lovely tapestry designed 
Out of appreciations reticent 
That with the silver thread of spirit blent 
The gold thread of emotion; and divined 
In splendid humor and forbearance kind 
The sweet illusiveness of life's event. 

We think of him as one who was apart, 
Yet loved the light swift play of amity; 
A great sweet spirit in whose ready heart 
Flourished the vivid bloom of delicacy — 
Loving a gesture, loving honest art, 
Loving man best, and man's contingency. 



[ 18 ] 



OBLIGATIONS 

I 

Edwin Arlington Robinson 

Stoic, ironic, subtle, keen, 
An artisan whose tools are bright — 
You vitalize your sombre scene 
By hintings of the infinite. 

II 

A. E. Housman 

"On Wenlock Edge the wood's in trouble" — so 

Wind, sun, and moon, and men were glad 

To bring their benisons of joy and woe 

To nourish the brave heart of the Shropshire Lad. 

Ill 

John Masefield 

"Here is the true swift flame," 
I felt when I saw you ; 
Then when the seventh sonnet came 
I knew ! 



[ 19 ] 



ACHIEVEMENT 

It made him passive, silent; his identity 
Was fast in the mordant dungeon of desire 
Until, one night, a little whisper was the key 
That drew the bolt, breathing to him, "Aspire!" . 
The corridors were void and murky — wondering, 
He groped his questing way, half-timid, fond — 
Then came the gesture of great curtains sundering, 
The proud ascending sweep, — and light beyond! 



[20 ] 



THE LECTURE ROOM 

Now God forgive you, pedagogue, 
An may He exorcise the fog 
That's crept and sidled in and curled 
Round the bright edges of this world ! . . 
"The True, the Beautiful, the Good?" 
Ah, yes, Sir: Quite, quite understood! 

Outdoors, the creeper's tawny leaf 
Taps on the pane, staccato, brief; 
There, nimble poplars with great thrusts 
Whip back the yelping autumn gusts ; 
There, lissome clouds play pitch and toss 
Here — vavTOiv fxerpov avOpwirosf 

Now this is just the kind of day 
To scatter old wan dust away, 
And this is just the kind of hour 
To shrivel pedantry's lean flower, 
And this is just the proper moment 
To fleer at dogma's musty foment — 
"The True, the Good, the Beautiful?" 
The rooti-tooti-tooti-ful! 

Philosopher! There's no more fog — 
The wind is whistling, — pedagogue ! 



[ 21 ] 



R- 



It's beyond you to help analyzing your emotions, 

Which consequently soon lose their original vigor; 

And the same devil of introspection 

Denies you the self-assurance you should have, 

And you dismay yourself rather than be ungenerous 

Even to a mere acquaintance . . . 

But you are as sensitive as sunlight 

And as rare as ether, 

And you flash upon us fresh and delicate and fine 

Like a cool wind from Griinewald. 



[22 ] 



THINGS 

Myself, walking — 

A thing of curious tissues, coordinations, 

Actions, responses; moulded, definite, mechanic; 

Rather strange, but commonplace enough 

Among several millions like it. 

A thing made up of stuff that other things 

Call "matter"— 

Totally apart from everything else, 

Singular, insular, quite alone. . . . 

I can go along over the sidewalk 
And never take root anywhere, 
But govern this queer form and move it about, 
Move it about the world and be assertive in the world 
But never quite of it, somehow. . . . 

Then there's that other, odder part of me : 
Not stuff like muscles, but a shiftier thing, 
A thing my fingers cannot touch — 
A thing, nevertheless, that makes me 
Part of everything else — 
(So that I can know that half an hour ago 
Something that was myself — serene, accustomed, 
Quite unquestioning — 
Stood way off down the street 
A half a mile from here) . 

And this other odder thing is full 
Of stranger complex things called passions — 
A thing called love, a thing called hate, 
A stranger thing than any (when you think about it) 

[ 23 ] 



THINGS 

Called ambition — 

And little, undefined, odd things, 

Moods and realizings and swift fresh happinesses. . 

And through it all a thing called mind 

Runs shuttling back and forth and says, 

"Do this," and "This is bad," and "This is autumn." 

And everything seems working out in kind ; 
Other people talk about love and hate and ideas 
And seem to mean the same thing I do 
When I talk about them. 

(Though why they should is quite beyond me — 
"Is my green green to you?") 

And while I walk I pass a man I know — 

An apothecary, swinging down to work. 

And I know a little about him — 

How he always eats in the Twentieth Century Lunch 

About midnight with a number of friends 

(I've often wondered what they have 

Such button-holing conversations about) . . . 

And I know that people owe him money, 

And that he comes from Pittsfield. 

Then a greyhound named Ansel comes by, 
High and gaunt and spare of gesture 
With shoulder-blades sliding as he runs. 

Several dusty yellow leaves sidle to the pavement. 

Now why should I be burrowing 
Into that piddling thing, my consciousness, 

[ 24] 



THINGS 

And worrying about it ? 

Though, as for that, 

Why shouldn't I? 

And what difference does it make 

Whether I know an apothecary, and pat Ansel, 

And watch a couple of leaves fall? 

And besides, why should I be myself 

And not an apothecary, 

Or Ansel, or a wizened leaf? 

(Quite so, why should I?) 



[ 25 ] 



BLACK-SMOKE 

I dream of how I used to love 
(A thousand years away) 
A pompous mandarin's one child 
Slim-eyed and quaint and gay — 
I was a rich young merchant-prince 
That trafficked in Cathay. 

And down beside the river's brim 
She'd sit and watch and hide 
Until my lateen-sailed old junk 
Would come down on the tide — 
And then beneath a bamboo bridge 
We'd sail off side by side. . . . 

Just round the corner of the world 

Is where the spice-lands lie, 

In just the curling of a leaf 

A century will die, 

Love is lacquer on a ring 

And chips off, by and by. 



[26 ] 



A WISH 

I wish I'd never even looked 

Into another's eyes 
Until I saw unveiled in yours 

The lights of Paradise. 

Lovelessness were worth the pain 
With such an anodyne — 

I wish I'd never kissed a girl 
Until your lips were mine. 



[27 ] 



SESTET 

When death shall set you in a pallid sheath 

And lay cold lips upon your breast to drain 

Your fibres of their salt ; when your sweet flesh 

Is sunken to a livid residue, 

When grim black earth the palms I loved shall stain, 

Shall I not weep for the too mortal you? . . . 



[28 ] 



YOU 

You shall be cloistered from the sun, 
And never see the twilight run 
Across the world, or know the dark — 
So that no thing shall ever mark 
Its mazed distressful need of you, 
Scorning all visions but the new — 

Jealously each leaf would bar 

The adulation of each star, 

And wind's lank fingers snatch and pull 

The smouldering rose, your thurible ; 

And moonlight on the sea devise 

A carpet up to Paradise 

For you to walk ; and every wave 

Bend down, a glittering ebon slave, 

To sweep for your swift passing by 

Yearning floors of porphyry. . . . 

You shall be cloistered from the sun, 
And never see the twilight run 
Across the world, or feel the air 
Fumbling with your quiet hair. 



[ 29 ] 



APOSTROPHE 

Little growing moon, tonight you are very young! 

Just a kid, out in the dark, 

And you've pulled the wings off a firefly. 

Tomorrow night you'll be a stripling, 

Off on a callow tipple 

With those idle apprentices, the stars; 

Shinning over the tree-fences 

And peeking in spinsters' windows — 

With the most innocent intentions in the world! 

But soon, little growing moon — 

(When you're a portly burgher, 

Puffy-cheeked, rubicund, and inclined to apoplexy, 

Dressed in russet, and very proud) — 

Then ! Ah, then, you'll be far too stolid and lofty, 

And much too complacent 

To notice 

How absurdly happy we shall be . . . down here . 

Four — or five — days from now 

When you've grown to be a portly burgher, 

Little growing moon ! 



[ 30 ] 



DALLIANCE 

There's a hidden, green-swept garden with a plot within its wall 
Where a lichened Pan is luting to a fawn ; 
There's a fountain rim a-brimming in a beaded waterfall, 
And an alabaster sun-dial on the lawn. 

A slender moon comes out at night to dust the dew with 

silver — 
Then like a swoon the scarlet sun will rise 
Mid spray of dusky opal in a veil to hide its splendor 
Till the little stars run back to Paradise. 

For April is a garden we have fashioned in our dreams, 

And Pan is at his magic not in vain, 

And his winsome music whispers round the garden wall and 

seems 
As witching as the gusts of springtime rain. 

Beware? Shall we beware how we reckon April's gifts? . . . 
Lo, the beauty that incarnadines the Spring 
Soon passes like a phantom where the petals lie in drifts — 
And the lute of Pan is such a fragile thing! 



[ 31 ] 



THE POET SINGS THE GAY MADNESS OF 
FASHION 

Sing no more the carnival, 
Sing no more the tournament, 
Venice is a pallid dream, 

Camelot is magic spent — 
Thebes and Babylon and Spain, 
Greece and Prester John's domain, 
Let oblivion's sombre reign 

Curtain close their faded hue — 
Rather sing — The Avenue ! 

(Sheherazade tripping, 
Godey-prints a-tripping, 
Flappers all a-tripping, 
Down the Avenue ! ) 

Undulant like pulsing jewels 
Before the eyes of Ariane, 
Like embodied melodies 

Fluttering from the heart of Pan — 
Svelte black angels, efflorescent, 
Maids demure and gay and pleasant, 
Haughty, frivolous, quiescent, 
Arch, bizarre, yea, worldly too, 
Strolling down the Avenue. 

(Gaucherie a-strolling, 
Watteau milkmaids strolling, 
Pierrette a-strolling, 
Down the Avenue!) 

[ 32 ] 



THE POET SINGS THE GAY MADNESS OF FASHION 

Silks from Kashmir, veils from Fez, 
Lace and lawn from out all nations, 
Boots from misty Vishnu-land, 

Miraculous mundane creations — 
Alabaster and dawn-blushed faces, 
Slender, angular, mad young graces, 
Curving in the sweetest places — 

Mohamet's Paradise comes true 

At five upon the Avenue ! 

(Hallucinations lilting, 
Seraphim a-lilting, 
Felicity a-lilting, 
Down the Avenue ! ) 



[ 33 ] 



TO SEVERAL 

You that I loved 

Before I loved her: 
You are kind enough not to flatter me 

With reproaches; 
And I am sagacious enough 
Never to look behind . . . 

If I did I might discover 

That your baffling lovely manner 

Was simply laziness — or stupidity . . . 

And that your mouth was out of drawing . . . 

And (worst of all) that your fey gauche spirit, 

Your winsome soul, that so intrigued me, 

Was simply a delicious 

Angularity of elbow . . . 

Perhaps I should never let this be printed, 
Because I seem to re-write it 
Every year. 



[ 34 ] 



ALL 

A bauble of slow-breathing scent 
That glows anon and darkling lingers, 
Making its moment opulent — 
A cigarette in slender fingers . . . 

A little play of level eyes 

A-glint with quick ephemeral yearning; 

An instant — and an enterprise . . . 

Then embers, dead and done with burning. 



[ 35 ] 



ODALISQUE 

I wonder if she ever tired of smiling 
Or grew a little weary of much gladness, 
And listlessly drooped down and faded, whiling 
The drowsy moments with a winsome sadness. 

And if her purple mouth grew tired of singing 
And lip on lip relaxed should lie quiescent, 
How softly would the scented air come, bringing 
Oblivion to caress that slender crescent. 

And if, perhaps, a lover kissed her so, 

His eyes might brim with generous pity, mild 

As rain at dawn, for it would be as though 

He had but kissed the mouth of a little child. . . 



[ 36 ] 



CATS 

Cats have no sense of humor, but like gray 
Back-yard Iagos brood and fiercely shrink, 
Stroking grim prickly whiskers as they think 
About affairs, revenges, brawls, and prey. . . . 

Cats to red gusty passions oft give way; 

They haunt old tarnished thresholds and they slink 

Along, intensely frustrate, on the brink 

Of antic doom, like banshees lithe and fey. . . . 

The only cat that ever smiled was he 

That grinned in sunny Cheshire formerly. . . . 

If cats should suddenly sprout up about 
Six times as big as they are now, no doubt 
The bold behemoth and the jaguar 
Would be less awful then than cats, by far. 



[ 37 ] 



SOME DAY 
(The Scrivener to His Fellow) 

Some day when we shall set about 
To fete our hour in cosmic mood, 
We'll rake the stars of heaven out 
To be paprika for our food; 

Our taste on comet-dust we'll whet 
And halibut, and all such victual, 
Dine at the Cafe Marionette, 
Nor count the cost one jot or tittle. 

Through darkest Fleet Street our composure 

Will match our saunter's enterprise, 

We'll be the absolute cynosure 

Of all poor free-lance neighboring eyes. 

Fawn-tinted gloves and swallow-tails 
We'll don, and toppers out of London, 
In fact we'll leave where nature fails 
Nothing, to paint the lily, undone. 

We'll condescend to editors, 

Be supercilious at the play, 

And swaggering call the critics bores 

Over the vintage wine — some day ! 



[ 38 ] 



WHEN I DIE 

I want to be buried in a motor hearse, 

And sail blandly a last time 

Up Fifth Avenue 

Some May-day dusk when the asphalt is all velvety 

With cool Spring rain. 

We'll go fast, stopping primly at the corners, 
And shooting through three speeds again 
In as many revolutions of the wheels. 

There'll be one car behind my hearse, 
Full of Hawaiian musicians 
Making degenerate music 
On three ukuleles. 

And we'll stop every little while at stores 

And buy a couple of books in expensive bindings — 

Keats perhaps, and Chaucer — 

And also tobacco in big proud tins, 

And a pair of brown gaiters 

And a silk shirt. 



[ 39 ] 



IMMORTALITY 

Dusty now, of course, with age, and rather yellow-tinted, 
Ornate like the carvings on the Waldorf-Astoria, 
Quite absurd they all seem — those volumes that were printed 
Early in the moments of the good Queen Victoria. 

That's the way this tome will be, eighty years from now — 
Musty to the touch and odd of print and queer of binding; 
As regards the verse : Your servant hates to wonder how 
Utterly depressing it will be in that far finding : 

"Oh, I say, do look — this is perfectly delicious," 

(Can you hear the voices, eight long decades from today?) 

"Here's some verse that really rhymes — how quaint! — how 

too too precious!" . . . 
And from some hand at that will fall, unseen, a leaf of bay! 



[ 40 ] 



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